love binds

Upon reading a favorite blogger of mine: littlejourneymama... i read a post she recently wrote and couldn't have related more to what she was talking about. So, adjusting some to apply to our family, space and circumstances I have cut and pasted and rewritten some of the same...

I don't think you can ever know how having a new child will affect your family. How could you? The small person that is your child shines and darkens in ways that have never appeared to you before. Sometimes there is a spark of recognition, a piece of your childhood, the smile of your brother or the eyes of your husband. But this person is new; new to the world and to the small village that is your home.

With the birth of each of my children, I died a small death and awoke to new love. With Tagen, it was the death of my independent self, a self that spent hours reading and napping and creating this or that, a self that jumped in the car without checking lists, packing diaper bags, or shoving shoes on tiny feet. With Aveda, it was the death of having one baby, the concentrated affection, the passing back and forth of one child. This is what felt like a small death to me. It's what made me cry, during those first days as I missed Tagen while staying in the hospital.

But the awaking! The new love, the kind of love that you never have for anyone else, not even your spouse. Love for my husband is constant and HUGE in me, but how many times have I watched my children sleep and felt that clutch of pity, the fierce protection that brings tears to my eyes? I've never felt love like this before having these children. It has made me intensely vulnerable, easily shaken, and yet as solid as the hills.

I've also watched my children's hearts expand with love as our family has grown. They open and blossom in care for one another, and this is what forms them, in addition to the love they receive from us. Aveda has never known a life without a brother. Tagen has received Aveda with such joy. Yesterday was Aveda's very first laugh and Tagen is the one who made her do it... over and over and over again as he jumped and spazzed being his silly self. Aveda just couldn't get enough of him. At her tender age of nearly 11 weeks old she adores her older brother.

In all the craziness, the dullness, the frustration of parenting, LOVE BINDS. Love takes our family and makes us a small force in the world. In all the ways I've changed since my first son was born, the biggest is that I am more loved, and I have more love.